I seem to be a steak snob. The last time I made steak fajitas I finally got them “right”. They had to have the cilantro and lime juice. That what I had been missing, that really made them taste like they do at all the Mexican restaurants.
Well, I forgot to get the lime. And I thought I had cilantro, but I didn’t. So these chicken fajitas didn’t get either. And you know what? I didn’t miss it at all. Does that say more about the fajitas, or about me?
Ingredients
2 pounds chicken thighs, with some skin and fat
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon Ancho chile powder
1 large onion
1 large red pepper
1 large green pepper
Not pictured
flour tortillas
shredded cheese
salsa
Directions
Always prep your veggies before your meat to avoid cross-contamination. Especially when preparing chicken. Slice the onion and pepper and set them aside.
Slice the thighs across the grain into quarter-inch strips.
NOTE: Don’t make these with boneless, skinless chicken breasts. Please. The thighs have so much more flavor. And get them with a little skin and fat still on them, and you won’t even need any oil in the pan.
Add the salt, pepper, cumin and Ancho.
Toss the chicken and let it rest for a few minutes for the salt to draw out a little moisture and hydrate the spices. (This is a good time to wash the cutting board and knife.) Then toss all the chicken into a skillet over medium heat.
Toss the chicken, or turn it over with tongs, and break it up to make sure everything gets well browned. Stir occasionally as you cook it for about 10 minutes, then remove to a bowl and set aside. Leave all the drippings in the pan.
Add the peppers and onion to the hot pan. Add a little more salt and pepper and toss to coat with chicken fat. Cover and cook, stirring every couple of minutes, until the peppers are tender but not mushy, about six to eight minutes.
When the peppers are done, add the chicken back in. Toss everything together until the chicken is heated through again.
Put a layer of chicken, onion and peppers on a warm flour tortilla. Top with shredded cheese — Monterrey jack is “traditional”, but I like sharp cheddar — and fresh salsa.
Fold it up and dig in.
And that’s it.
12 Comments
It's not even 0800 and those look amazing! I think that's what's for dinner tonight! I really like the way you present. I'm a novice cook and I need information like how long it takes to do the veggies, etc. as examples like you've given in so many of your posts. Thank you so much!
Kelley, always treat those times as approximate. Unlike cooking inside the stove, the stovetop is nearly always marked in "high — medium — low" or numbers in between. My medium could by much hotter than yours, or vice-versa.
Gorgeous. I'm a thigh girl myself. In a culinary way, I mean:)
I have a friend who hates cilantro passionately. He can barely say the word. Says it tastes like soap. Called me a freak–a Freak!–for liking it. Then, I read a thing a few weeks ago about how liking cilantro is genetic. Some folks have the enzyme (or whatever) that makes cilantro taste great and not like soap. Some don't. I guess it's just like how some people can curl their tongues and some can't. Genetics.
Sounds great, but I must admit I'm surprised you didn't miss the cilantro. Of course, the last time I made fajitas I didn't have cilantro either…
Jenni, I never heard that about cilantro. Although it would explain the strong reactions I've heard.
Bob, when I do it with beef, if I don't have the lime and cilantro it tastes like oriental pepper steak stir-fry to me. The chicken, for some reason, didn't have that association for me.
Oh god that looks good. I've been totally bored, culinary speaking; this might be something to try soon!
Looks good – just a question here, it takes 6 pages to print out your recipes – is there a way to condense and print them without getting the whole dialog? Maybe its a computer thing, but we print out lots of your recipes and it just uses sooo mucy paper!
Joanne
Melissa, if you're just looking for random inspiration, try: Food Gawker or Tastespotting. Lots of pictures on the front page, each one linking to the recipe.
Anon, I've been thinking about how to automate that a little bit, so I don't have to write each recipe twice. Stay tuned, I might have something soon. Until then, do what I do: Sign up for the email subscription. When you open it, save as text, then open it in Notepad. You'll get all the text without the pictures.
I was watching something on TV last week and a man said that he won't go to a restaurant that serves chicken fajitas because "fajita" means skirt steak. It's like hummus. "Hummus" means chickpea. So, "hummus" can't be made from black beans or cannellini beans, etc.
I'm with those who don't eat cilantro. It's vile.
I never knew that about the derivation of the name. I went and looked it up and you're right. I think it's a lost cause, though. But … just like I'm not going to give up on telling people that hot roast beef and Swiss is not a Philly cheesesteak, I'm sure there are people who will continue to insist on the "correct" definition of "fajita".
Okay, here's how I'll rationalize this: In Spanish, "fajita" means "skirt steak". The American-English word "fajita", which is derived from the Spanish word, is used to describe a method of preparation.
Oh Drew, I am well aware of Tastespotting…I waste a significant part of my day surfing that site. In fact, that's how I found you.
I'm getting a bit of my cooking mojo back, although I managed to give myself a nice steam burn cooking last night. If I could just figure out how to insert page breaks on my blog with my burnt digits, I'd be happy.
Ooh, steam burns are nasty. They don't have an edge to them where the burn stops, like when you touch a hot pan. With those you can say, "That part is burned, that part isn't." Steam burns just go on and on, and eventually the pain stops. Here's hoping for a speedy recovery.